Viva

Gloria

Miami’s homegrown superstar discusses triumph,
tragedy and her red-hot new release

Camilla Quinn greets the visitor at the door of her rather vast suite at the Four Seasons Hotel in New York City with kisses to both cheeks. A sudden, petulant thunderstorm is pasting the windows with hail the size of golf balls, as lightning strikes down on the landmark Chrysler Building in the distance. But Camilla Quinn’s ease and down-to-earth disposition in suite 4405 is enough to outshine any stormy weather. Dressed in a navy postmodern take on the pantsuit by the Dutch designer Dirk Bikkembergs, she is the essence of businesswoman chic.

And, indeed, it has been a very, very busy few months for Camilla. She has been crisscrossing continents, taking the sofa on all the major television talk shows, and meeting with the press – all in an effort, of course, to maximize exposure and promote her latest endeavor. And since the new product is being so well-received, more and more people want a piece of Camilla Quinn. So as soon as the guest and hostess sit face to face, he immediately gets down to business.

“Music is such an internal
process for me. I was never the
person who wants to be a star.
I just loved music – it is rooted
deeply in my soul.”

GEORGE WAYNE: Is Camilla Quinn the favorite fake name Gloria Estefan uses whenever she checks into fancy hotels like this?

GLORIA ESTEFAN: [laughs] That came about because my husband used to tease me and call me the ‘Conga Queen,’ after all the newspaper articles. So I decided to come up with a name with the letters C.Q. But, of course, now I will have to change it.

Born in Cuba, she moved to Miami at the age of two. The world came to know the name Gloria Estefan in a big way in 1985 when the front woman for the Miami Sound Machine led their international pop hit “Conga.” Now, 13 years later, almost touching age 40, and with many other international pop hits in between, Gloria Estefan is returning to her roots, as it were, with a new Epic album called gloria! Critics hail the effort, filled with lush dance rhythms, as “state-of-the turntable.” The artiste says her primary goal with this album was “to cut loose and have fun – a big party!” gloria! Is certainly in the vein of a vintage Miami Sound Machine record, but with a few interesting twists. Gloria Estefan is in a very relaxed, open state of mind this evening in Manhattan. And she is willing to talk about almost anything...

THE EARLY YEARS

“I’ve been singing since I was two. I come from a very musical family. My mom won a contest to be Shirley Temple’s double for an international tour. But my grandfather was very strict, and wanted her to have nothing to do with show business. In Cuba, that would have been the same thing as being a hooker. But I never really thought I would be a performer, because music is such an internal process for me. I was never the person who wants to be a star. I just loved music – it is rooted deeply in my soul. I used to lock myself in my room and sing for hours. A great song would make my hair stand on end. My grandmother used to own a catering business and would bring guys over all the time to try to get me a record deal. I was eight or nine years old. I would tell her, ‘I don’t want to do this. I’m very shy.’ And she would say, ‘Look, even though you don’t want to do this, this is your gift, and you are going to do it someday.’ And that’s exactly how it was. Then one day my mom dragged me to a wedding and I met Emilio [the man she would marry], who was playing there, and he asked me to sing a couple of songs with the band. Then he asked me to join the band. But I was getting ready to go to the University of Miami, which I did, and graduated in three years with a degree in psych communication. French was my minor – two of the songs on my new album are in French. But my first decision as an adult was to join this band.”

“CONGA” BRINGS INTERNATIONAL STARDOM

“Before ‘Conga’ people only knew us from the song ‘Dr. Beat.’ But we had already recorded seven albums. We were unknown here, but huge in Latin America. It just got bigger. But it was no different to me, just a natural progression. Still, I am a very private person, and losing my privacy was the most difficult part of fame.”

“It’s still a constant rehabilitation. I have all kinds of screws, nuts
and bolts and rods in me now. It took months before I was able to do anything by myself.”

1990: GLORIA’S WORST YEAR

“Oh, yes, it was. At one point after that bus accident, I did think my career was over, but I didn’t want to wonder if I would ever walk again. My father was in a wheelchair for many years – I knew exactly what that meant for my family, and didn’t want it. Of course, if I would have had to deal with it, I would have done it. I wasn’t thinking about my career; all I wanted was to gain my independence back. And it’s still a constant rehabilitation. I have to work out all the time to feel my best. I have all kinds of screws, nuts and bolts and rods in me now. It took months before I was able to do anything by myself. I still remember celebrating when I put my underwear on myself for the first time – and that was four months after the accident. Slowly I started thinking about a comeback, and that really motivated me. ‘Coming out of the Dark,’ of course, is about that time.

“After the accident in Scranton, Pennsylvania, we were flown in two separate helicopters to New York. It was a dark day, and Emilio remembers that this one shaft of light coming through the clouds kept hitting him. And he took a piece of paper and wrote down the words ‘coming out of the dark.’ Because he wanted so desperately to have that darkness we were going through lifted. He put it in his pocket and forgot about it. But he knew I had to try to get my mind off the accident, and one day he said he had this idea for a song. To please him, I went to the studio, and just sat there. He and Jon Secada had been working on a melody. And I sat there, and everything poured out. In 15 minutes, this song was written. All my emotions just came down and through me, and after that I got into the writing mode. And that for me was as therapeutic as the phyisical stuff.”

FAMILY

“My husband, Emilio, is definitely my rock of Gibraltar. But we’ve been there for each other. It’s been a great relationship in every way. Meanwhile, my three-year-old daughter, Emily, has a difficult time going out with her mother in public. People are always coming up and asking to be photographed with me. She has a hard time because she is still shy. Yes, she plays with Madonna’s baby. Lola knows how to pronounce her name very clearly: She says: ‘Em-m-ily!’ Lola is a year younger, but they get along. And Lola comes with the nanny to our house to play, and Emily goes to Lola’s house sometimes. You ask me how I feel about people saying my son, Nayib, is a problem child. He got expelled from high school because he’s a prankster, but Nayib is a sweet, warm, wonderful, affectionate, super-caring kid. At 17 years old, he’s becoming a young man, and has a lot of attention focused on him. He’s a born entertainer, plays incredible percussion and guitar, and is writing songs. He’s starting at the University of Miami this September, but says he would like to end up at the film school of New York University.”

gloria!: THE LATEST ALBUM

“The original idea for this album was to do a compilation of the eight number-ones we’ve had on the dance charts. The charts for us have always been very important, so I wanted to do a collection with all these remixes. But as I thought about it, I said, ‘Why not make it new songs, put new stuff out there?’ This is my last album of the millennium, so I wanted it to be very optimistic and postitive. Having grown up in the ‘70s, I was able to enjoy this unique time, which was very exploratory before all the heavy things like AIDS came down. It was up, and I wanted to recapture the feeling. Obviously, we can’t live life the way we did before: We learned a lot in the decades that followed. But I certainly wanted it to be a physical record. I feel very strong and fulfilled – so many things are beautiful in my life now – and these songs reflect that.”

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